


Cat Carnival

by griffonskies



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Characters as Cats, Mentioned Keith (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-10
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-15 05:40:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18067625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/griffonskies/pseuds/griffonskies
Summary: Lance sat on the windowsill, his tail flicking back and forth as he watched the carnival parade on the street below. The top window part was half open to let in the noise from the outside. Horns blowing, loud music and even louder singing, yelling and laughter in abundance.





	Cat Carnival

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote a little ficlet for the @the-shance-games 
> 
> prompts music + confetti
> 
> Very partially inspired by caturady and the Aristocats.
> 
> Featuring Bengal Lance, Norwegian forest cat Shiro, mention of Keith and random carnival participants.

Lance sat on the windowsill, his tail flicking back and forth as he watched the carnival parade on the street below. The top window part was half open to let in the noise from the outside. Horns blowing, loud music and even louder singing, yelling and laughter in abundance.

Every now and again a parade float or balloon would rise high enough to pass right in front of Lance and he would rise on his hind legs, paws on the window to see better.

“Shiro! Shiro, you should see this. They even have lions this year!”

“Oh? What do they look like?” asks Shiro, curled up on the sofa across the windows of the grand piano room. Lance had to turn his ears to hear him across the distance and over the noise outside.

“So many colors! There is a pretty blue one, and a yellow and green. Oh, there’s one in black, just like you!”

Shiro raised his head to look fondly at Lance, “Call me when the ones with the big bells come? I’d like to see those again.” he yawned and curled up even tighter in the sunspot falling over the couch cushion. Black and white fluff over cream colored fabric. 

Lance flickered his brown ears but let Shiro sleep, knowing the other had slept poorly the last few days. First fretting over one of their humans getting sick and then from pain in his lost limb.

The day dragged on as group after group passed in front of their windows. Every now and again some floats would throw confetti around them, and if they were high enough the colored pieces of paper or plastic would float in through the open window and around Lance. The last human threw so much confetti through the window that Lance got covered in them. The human noticed his mistake and waved merrily at the cat watching him from the window.

Lance shook the colorful paper circles off, but one stuck to his nose and made him sneeze before he removed it.

The sun had already set and the street lamps lit the crowds by the time Lance could see the last group coming up the street. He jumped off the windowsill and silently trotted over to Shiro.

“Shiro? The group with the bells is coming up.” He jumped on the couch and head bumped at the other cat to wake him up. He licked at one fluffy black ear as Shiro stretched and rubbed his head under Lance’s chin.

Shiro was easily the biggest and most regal cat Lance has ever seen, and probably the fluffiest. Lance being a proud Bengal himself was by no ways small but Shiro still towered over him and had to sit sideways on the windowsill to not fall off. Lance sat right in front of Shiro and nuzzled into his front as they got settled in to watch the carnival.

Lance loved seeing his sleek bronze and brown spotted coat mixed with Shiro’s longer black and white fur. 

The last group was slowly making their way down the street, the street lights dimming as they passed for effect. There was a sea of people with warm glowing lanterns on long poles that they waved and swayed around. They had bells around their bodies, varying in size and sound, they chanted and rang their bells in sync. An old melody meant to call forth the spring.

Lance felt himself and Shiro pouring to the rhythm of it.

* * *

The streets were long empty by the time one of their humans came into the room to give them food.

Shiro jumped to greet him, being closer to this human than the others. Lance personally thought that the human had atrocious fur on his head. Lance would not be helping groom that particular mop any time soon, no sir!

The human kneeled down, set out the food bowls and let Shiro head bunt against his outstretched fingers. He reached his other hand out too, but Lance ignored it and went straight for the food bowl not covered in pinkish powder. He didn’t know what that strange smelling powder was, but it seemed to help with Shiro’s pain, so he was not touching that. Shiro chuffed at him in amusement.

“The others and I are going out tonight,” said the human who has set down by them on the floor as they finished eating. Lance, uninterested, yawled at him. The human stopped talking, which Lance counted as a win, but then he pulled out a string from his pocket and waved it in front of Lance’s widening eyes. 

“Pidge insisted that we just had to go celebrate with her brother,” the human said to Shiro as Lance pounced at the string end. “So you two will be alone tonight. Take care of the house, okay?” Shiro meowed at him in affirmation and the human raised from the floor and, with one last goodbye, was out the room.

Lance was still playing with the string, rolling and bouncing all over the floor. There was a thump sound, the string pulled on the other end and was yanked out of his paws. Lance looked over and found Shiro holding the other end of the string, eyes shining with an invitation to play.

They ran around and play tussled. In the end, they landed in a heap on the floor which then turned to cuddling and grooming.

The old grandfather clock in the hallway chimed once, twice, and Lance was already up and excited. He didn’t need to hear the rest of the chimes to know that it was his favorite time of the day.

It was time to practice piano.

Every aristocratic cat learned how to play piano or another instrument from kitten age. His own mamma had been diligent to teach her kittens about life in high cat society. Grooming, manners, bearing. But Lance’s favorite had been playing the piano.

And now as a grown cat in an aristocratic household, ( _“Lance, I don’t think a group of students in an apartment is really what they meant by aristocrat.” “Shiro, they have a Grand Piano. They’re aristocratic enough.”_ ) it was his job to keep his piano skills sharp.

The added bonus was that he got to teach Shiro how to play piano!

For all that Shiro was a majestic cat bread, he was born a barn cat, and there came to live with the mop-headed human.

From bits and pieces, Lance has gathered that at one point Shiro had even bravely faced a young bear to protect the mop-headed human, getting his wounds in the process. Lance called him heroic, Shiro called himself lucky, since his jumping out had made the bear stumble and fall into the nearby stream, which shocked it enough to run away.

But all in all, that meant that it fell on Lance to show Shiro the finer points of city life. And more to the point cat aristocracy. Which meant playing piano.

Lance jumped on the piano bench and scoffed at the closed piano lid. Shiro joined him on the bench, and together they pushed up the lid.

“You ready to continue where we stopped yesterday.” asked Lance, excited and full of energy.

Shiro smiled at him. “I’ll do my best. Please be patient with me.”

Lance head bunted at him in affection “You’ll be great as always.” And Shiro purred back at him.

Lance skillfully jumped on the piano keys to play the D major chord.

“So, we covered the major and minor scales, now…”


End file.
